Sledge journeys began with the spring.  Depots were laid down, and the final march to the South was begun on November 2, 1902, by Scott, Shackleton, and Wilson.

They had nineteen dogs to begin with.  On November 27 they passed the 80th parallel.  Owing to the nature of the ground their progress was not rapid; the highest latitude was reached on December 30 —­ 82deg. 17’ S. New land was discovered —­ a continuation of South Victoria Land.  One summit after another rose higher and higher to the south.

The return journey was a difficult one.  The dogs succumbed one after another, and the men themselves had to draw the sledges.  It went well enough so long as all were in health; but suddenly Shackleton was incapacitated by scurvy, and there were only two left to pull the sledges.

On February 3 they reached the ship again, after an absence of ninety-three days.

Meanwhile Armitage and Skelton had reached, for the first time in history, the high Antarctic inland plateau at an altitude of 9,000 feet above the sea.

The relief ship Morning had left Lyttelton on December 9.  On her way south Scott Island was discovered, and on January 25 the Discovery’s masts were seen.  But McMurdo Sound lay icebound all that year, and the Morning returned home on March 3.

The expedition passed a second winter in the ice, and in the following spring Captain Scott led a sledge journey to the west on the ice plateau.  In January, 1904, the Morning returned, accompanied by the Terra Nova, formerly a Newfoundland sealing vessel.  They brought orders from home that the Discovery was to be abandoned if she could not be got out.  Preparations were made for carrying out the order, but finally, after explosives had been used, a sudden break-up of the ice set the vessel free.

All the coal that could be spared was put on board the Discovery from the relief ships, and Scott carried his researches further.  If at that time he had had more coal, it is probable that this active explorer would have accomplished even greater things than he did.  Wilkes’s “Ringgold’s Knoll” and “Eld’s Peak” were wiped off the map, and nothing was seen of “Cape Hudson,” though the Discovery passed well within sight of its supposed position.

On March 14 Scott anchored in Ross Harbour, Auckland Islands.  With rich results, the expedition returned home in September, 1904.

Meanwhile the German expedition under Professor Erich von Drygalski had been doing excellent work in another quarter.

The plan of the expedition was to explore the Antarctic regions to the south of Kerguelen Land, after having first built a station on that island and landed a scientific staff, who were to work there, while the main expedition proceeded into the ice.  Its ship, the Gauss, had been built at Kiel with the Fram as a model.

The Gauss’s navigator was Captain Hans Ruser, a skilful seaman of the Hamburg-American line.